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The Popular Life of
Subliminal Influence
Charles Acland
“A comprehensive and compelling archaeology of the
dream of invisible influence through media, this is a much-needed and
frighteningly contemporary history.” ¯Fred Turner, author of From
Counterculture to Cyberculture: Stewart Brand, the Whole Earth Network, and the
Rise of Digital Utopianism
“Making an important intervention in media and
cultural history, Charles R. Acland examines how a seemingly
‘fringe’ technological practice became a lightning rod for public
anxiety about the power of the media. As he argues, the idea of subliminal
influence is still very much with us. It may have been scientifically refuted,
but it is clearly of continuing relevance in popular suspicions about the
relationship between media, information, and consciousness.” ¯Jeffrey
Sconce, author of Haunted Media: Electronic Presence from Telegraphy to
Television
"It’s a sober book covering an occasionally weird stretch of cultural territory. Acland, a professor of communication studies at Concordia University, in Montreal, calls the concept of subliminal influence a form of “vernacular cultural critique.” It operates in a zone lying somewhere between social science and urban legend. And the belief is a hardy one. Over the years, public-opinion surveys in the United States have found that between 50 and 70 percent of respondents think that advertisers used subliminal techniques, with comparably high levels of belief in their effectiveness." ¯Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed
Since the late 1950s, the idea that hidden, imperceptible messages could influence mass behaviour has been debated, feared, and ridiculed. In Swift Viewing, Charles R. Acland reveals the secret story of subliminal influence, showing how an obscure concept from experimental psychology became a mainstream belief about our vulnerability to manipulation in an age of media clutter. He chronicles the enduring popularity of the dubious claims about subliminal influence, tracking their migration from nineteenth-century hypnotism to twentieth-century front-page news. His expansive history of popular concern about subliminal messages shows how the notion of “hidden persuaders” became a vernacular media critique, one reflecting anxiety about a rapidly expanding media environment. Through a deep archive of eclectic examples, including educational technology in the American classroom, mind-control tropes in science fiction, Marshall McLuhan’s media theories, and sensational claims in the late 1950s about subliminal advertising, Acland establishes the subliminal as both a product of and a balm for information overload.
Duke University Press
February 2012 336pp 9780822349198 PB £16.99 now only £11.50 when you quote CS0212PLSI when you order